1. Field of the Present Invention
The present invention is in the field of data processing systems and more specifically, thermal analysis of data processing systems.
2. History of Related Art
Thermal management is an increasingly important consideration in the design and implementation of data processing systems. This is especially true for compact or dense server arrangements such as blade servers and blade centers. A blade server (see, e.g., IBM eServer BladeCenter) is a type of rack-optimized server. Blade server designs range from ultra-dense, low-voltage, lesser-performing servers to high-performance, lower density servers to proprietary, customized rack solutions that include some blade features. A blade center refers to an enclosure that can hold a number of hot-swappable blade servers.
The Thermal Analysis Application cited above addresses a system and method of thermal monitoring with particular emphasis on blade server and blade center implementations. The thermal modeling disclosed in the Thermal Analysis Application is suitable for selecting a configuration state that most nearly matches a thermal configuration state reported by a set of thermal sensors. The thermal modeling Thermal Analysis Application assumed that information provided by thermal sensors is accurate and reliable. This assumption may not be appropriate in every application and environment. If a thermal sensor malfunctions and the data it reports is not accurate, a thermal model that assumes accurate data might indicate an erroneous configuration state. Accordingly, it would be desirable to implement a thermal modeling application for a data processing system that encompassed the possibility of a malfunctioning thermal sensor into its analysis.